Hey Oscar, beware of imitations

The engaging performance of Viola Davis (right, with co-star Emma Stone) in The Help is deserving of Oscar votes.

Actor Meryl Streep is not worthy this time around, argues Jim Schembri.

There is, it must be said, a giddy sense of inevitability around Meryl Streep's prospects of taking out the best actress Oscar for her portrayal of British prime minister Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. And there is, it must be said, a lot of support behind the hype, with almost every reviewer applauding Streep for getting Thatcher exactly right.

Yet there are two powerful reasons Streep should not - nay, must not - win the Oscar.

The first - and most compelling - is that Streep, for all of her alleged brilliance, does not deserve it. Performances based on historical figures have their cosmetic challenges: an actor must capture the look, voice and mannerisms everybody is so familiar with. Beyond that, a truly great performance will leap over the obvious to get under the skin and into the soul of a character. That is when somebody who viewers think they know truly comes to life on the screen. Colin Firth did it with King George VI in The King's Speech; Frank Langella did it with Richard Nixon in Frost/Nixon; Morgan Freeman did it for Nelson Mandela with Invictus.

Streep doesn't do that in The Iron Lady. Her portrait is composed almost entirely of high-definition mimicry expertly gleaned from endless hours of TV news footage. It is an effective and accurate impersonation, no doubt, but what we get to know of the ''real'' Maggie comes largely from ''conversations'' she has with her dead husband - an awkward dramatic device and one of the reasons the film itself is far less compelling than Streep's channelling of Thatcher. There are no revelations in the character, no surprises, no journey we didn't know about already.

Much the same applies to fellow Oscar nominee Michelle Williams, whose turn as Marilyn Monroe in My Week with Marilyn certainly gets the pout and the swagger right but gives us too little insight. And, to be frank, copying a famous figure is a relative cinch compared to performances that are scratch-built. This is why the portrayals by Glenn Close in Albert Nobbs and Viola Davis in The Help are infinitely more engaging and admirable to behold.

Who cares about some anonymous woman passing herself off as a servant in 19th century Ireland? Who cares about a lowly black, semi-articulate maid in 1960s Mississippi? We do, deeply, because of the richness and humanity these actors bring to their films.

It is a generalisation, of course, but to conjure a character unfamiliar to most filmgoers from virtually nothing and breathe life into them is a tougher task than portraying one with 101 reference points for audiences to mentally tick off.

The second reason Streep must not win is that victory for her will spell defeat for the Oscars as it stumbles further down the wrong path. Having been nominated 17 times - a record but she has won only twice - another doorstop for Streep would merely entrench the staid mindset Oscar has been trying to shed. Rather than being fresh and vital and progressive, her win would appear stale and safe.

With low ratings reflecting a largely apathetic public, Oscar has been striving to sex up its image by pulling focus on the type of big, popular films it typically shuns, hoping it will draw in the younger folk who would rather be tweeting than watch a montage of those greats who have passed away. In 2009, Oscar expanded the best film category to encompass blockbuster films such as Avatar and Inception. It has greatly expanded its interactive online profile and has tried hard to satiate the demand for something new, surprising, young and fresh.

Last year's ceremony featured a concerted effort by Oscar to woo the young 'uns - and it tanked. The US rating of 37 million was a big drop from the high of 2010's 41 million and alarmingly close to 2008's record low of 32 million. Hip young hosts James Franco and Anne Hathaway simply didn't click and the gags fell flat. The big winner, The King's Speech - worthy though it was - reflected the sort of film latter-day Oscar has favoured. The event was not the out-and-out disaster many high-profile people claimed - Chicago Sun-Times critic Roger Ebert declared it the worst Oscars ever - but the attempt to lunge forward had ''lame'' written all over it.

This year, instead of forging ahead, Oscar has contracted cold feet and hit reverse, which is a pity because it was all looking so good. Director-producer Brett Ratner (Tower Heist, X-Men 3, Red Dragon, Rush Hour 1, 2 and 3) was all set to produce with hotly anticipated livewire Eddie Murphy as host. Ratner was then pressured to resign after saying that rehearsal was for ''fags''. Murphy quickly followed.

It was a stupid remark, for which Ratner apologised - he also made idiotic remarks on Howard Stern's radio show about his sexual conquests - but losing him, then Murphy, effectively meant the exciting new direction in which Oscar was heading got cut short over some badly chosen words. In Murphy's place, Oscar has dusted off Billy Crystal, who will return for his ninth gig. Same old, same old.

More telling, though, is how the line-up of films reflects a return to the practice of honouring films almost nobody has seen. Recent big winners - Crash, No Country for Old Men, The Reader, The Hurt Locker - have been critical darlings rather than audience favourites. And, to quote the gentle giant in Twin Peaks, it is happening again.

The Help is the most successful of the lot, having taken a little more than $200 million worldwide, thanks mostly to word-of-mouth support. But with a meagre four nominations, it is not the front-runner.

Heading the field with 11 nominations is Martin Scorsese's Hugo - a $170 million film adored by critics but a box-office disaster with a worldwide tally of around $110 million. Silent French comedy The Artist has 10 nominations, and while its take of about $60 million is great for a low-budget $15 million film, it is another example of a film favoured more by the cinematic cognoscenti than by the masses.

It is a stinging irony that while these two films celebrate cinema, their Oscar prominence also signals how the chasm between the ceremony that honours it and the people who pay to see it seems wider than ever.

But can what ails Oscar be fixed?

The attempt to reinvigorate public interest and cultural relevance by amending the rules to allow the best film list to expand from five to 10 was good start. An amendment to the amendment now allows for a floating tally of up to ten films, depending on how the preferential votes fall in the impossible-for-mortals-to-understand Academy voting system. This year there are nine films.

Applying the same principle to other major categories could allow for those worthy contenders usually deemed as having been "snubbed" to get a shot at the title. There has been much carping, for instance, over Tilda Swinton not getting a nod for her superb work in We Need to Talk About Kevin and for Michael Fassbender missing out on a berth for his spellbinding work in Shame. This inevitably happens every year. Lengthening the list could broaden Oscar's appeal and re-establish its withering connection with audiences.

Lengthening the list, however, could also lead to lengthening the show - which is something absolutely nobody wants. This leads to the other big issue that has been hobbling the Oscars for far too long. At the end of the day, the Oscar ceremony has to be great television, but all attempts to rejig, rejuvenate and redefine the ceremony have taken place within the traditional format that has ruled the podium since the 1970s. This involves long musical numbers, comedy skits, special awards and, most crucially, the staggered reading of the nominations and winners.

In 1979, long-hauling Oscar host Johnny Carson famously opened the ceremony with this gem: "Welcome to the Academy Awards, a glittering two hours of entertainment, spread out over four hours." As is always the case with great comedy, it was funny because it was true. And still is.

As an event, the production principles have always been too scared to step beyond the confines of tradition. There was genuine excitement that Ratner would infuse some new ideas into the telecast, and defiant hope remains that his replacement Brian Glazer (Ron Howard's producing partner) will not be afraid to colour outside the lines. Because there is much that can be done.

A shorter show can be a better show. We don't need to hear every nominated song, the elaborate stagings of which are typically production centrepieces. (Thankfully, there are only two this year. When there's four or more it can account for half an hour of solid tedium.) Comedy skits should be leaner and sharper, as was the case with the memorable Ben Stiller/Owen Wilson Lord of the Rings skit. Some special awards and honours can be part of a separate event, which already happens with the "technical" Oscars.

A recurring complaint is the length of speeches, with winners often having to scream over the mandatory music cue for them to leave the stage. This is probably the most embarrassing problem with the Oscars, made all the more so for how easy it is to remedy.

To be perfectly blunt, and with all sincere respect, there are some people filmgoers are more eager to hear from than others. The actors, writers, directors and producers - we want their thoughts about their big, life-changing, God-inspired wins. On the other side of the pancake - and without, for a picosecond, wishing to diminish their creativity, ingenuity or artistry in any way whatsoever - what the seven winners of the Oscar for best sound effects editing have to say is something they can do at length either at a separate ceremony, or after the main one to an online audience.

And is there any compelling reason why each category has to laboriously be read out, with nominations first before the winner is announced? It is designed to build tension, but if that held true the ratings wouldn't traditionally droop off as the night lumbered towards the peak award of best picture.

There must surely be a better, more efficient and exciting way to streamline this.

One idea is that each major film could be subject to a special presentation in which all of their nominations are covered in one hit. Those films with only one or a few nods - regardless of whether they are in "minor" categories (an awful term) - could all be covered at once. This could be done in a highly entertaining way with the invaluable assistance of the montages Oscar loves so deeply. Then one climactic block of the ceremony would see all the winners announced in sequence, one after the other, with an appropriate build up to the big ones.

A relatively recent problem Oscar has had to wrestle with is deciding upon whose unfortunate shoulders the onerous duties of hosting should rest, iron-girder like. This never used to be an issue because there was always a Bob Hope or a Johnny Carson. Billy Crystal's return is a switch back to a reliable option and an acknowledgement that the recent slew of different hosts haven't worked. It's a safe option that will no doubt work, yet again.

But Oscar needs something fresh, something vital, something of the minute that captures the cultural zeitgeist like a mouse on a glue trap. So here's an idea.

Instead of approaching people and offering them the honour of hosting the Oscars, why not adopt a far more contemporary approach - and have people fight for the gig on a reality TV series, Idol-style? Open the job up, sift through the applicants through auditions, and subject those on the short list to a series of rigourous talent tests such as ad-libbing, writing their own material, dealing with unexpected events - as David Niven so famously did in 1974 when a streaker hit the stage (though there remains contention this was a set up) - and, of course, finishing their routines on cue.

High-profile people would be the natural preference, but there's no reason why up-and-comers - unknown comics; movie extras; TV hopefuls; game show models - couldn't front up. Then you screen the show - Oscar Idol; So You Think You Can Host the Oscars; America's Next Top Oscar Host - for three months in the lead up to the official Oscar movie season.

That'd help build some buzz.

And if there's any one thing Oscar has a problem with right now, it's that.

The 84th Academy Awards are presented from 12.30pm on Monday.

As the countdown to the Oscars gathers momentum let's take a quick glance at who and what should take out the coveted doorstops.

Best Actor: It's a tussle between George Clooney for his deftly etched, hurting suburban dad in The Descendants or Brad Pitt as the baseball manager in Moneyball. It's neck-and-neck, but we'll give it to George by a nose for being the more moving. What Gary Oldman is doing with a nomination for the snoozefest of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy probably has more to do with having a "prestige" British film in the running than for any inherent worth.

Best Actress: Meryl Streep might have the running for channelling Maggie in The Iron Lady - Channelling Maggie would actually have been a more appropriate title - but the bones tell us it has to be Viola Davis for give the civil rights drama The Help so much heart. Runner up is Glenn Close for her sterling work playing a male servant in the period film Albert Nobbs. Michelle Williams does a fine impersonation of Monroe in My Week With Marilyn but its not worthy of a bug crusher; same with Rooney Mara, who is undoubtedly impressive in pulpy The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, but is essentially there to draw the kids in.

Supporting Actor: Kenneth Branagh almost deserves this for doing Larry Olivier in Marilyn, but the statue is going to go where it should, and that's to veteran Christopher Plummer for his extraordinarily touching performance as the latter-day gay dad in Beginners. Fellow journeyman Max von Sydow does too little in the not-very-good 9/11 drama Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close; Jonah Hill's nomination for Moneyball will be boost enough for his burgeoning career; Nick Nolte shouldn't be here for his cheeseball turn in the more-average-than-anybody-wants-to-admit fight movie Warrior.

Best Actress: Forget about it. If Octavia Spencer doesn't win this for her magnificent scene-stealing, show-stopping performance in The Help, there'll probably be a riot in the theatre. Her friend Melissa McCarthy, nominated for Bridemaids, will applaud loudly, as will Spencer's ridiculously versatile co-star Jessica Chastain.

Best Film: The big fear here is that if Martin Scorsese's Hugo wins the media will seize upon the fact it was a box office flop that critics happened to love. So the award will - and certainly should - go to The Help, a touching, important film that was also a word-of-mouth hit. And that's what Oscar really needs to do - acknowledge a quality film that audiences embraced.

Best Director: Will go to Martin Scorsese as a major consolation prize for not winning best film. And he deserves it for his 3D work-of-art masterpiece.

Best original screenplay: Stand by for a shock. Though Woody Allen is favoured to take it for his breakout comedy hit Midnight in Paris, it actually should go to Asghar Farhadi for the exceptional Iranian drama A Separation. Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo should be happy to be nominated in such company for their raucous, trend-starting comedy Bridesmaids. And a sour point - Michel Hazanavicius' screenplay for the highly derivative silent movie comedy The Artist really has no place in a category that celebrates originality. This overrated film really takes the slot that the cancer dramedy 50/50 should have occupied.

Best adapted screenplay: Hugo will take this over Moneyball, The Descendants, the terrific political drama The Ides of March and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, another what-is-it-doing-here? inclusion that takes the place of a far more deserving film, in this case We Need To Talk About Kevin.

Best Animated Feature: Lovely as Puss in Boots and Kung Fu Panda were, they were franchise films. Rango, however, showed real spark, vitality and originality.

Elsewhere: Cinematography has to go to Hugo, though Tree of Life and Steven Spielberg's War Horse deserve honourable mention (which is what a nomination is, come to think of it). Editing to Hugo too, as well as costumes; art direction to The Artist; Best Make Up is a clinch for The Iron Lady, as it accounts for half of Streep's performance (another thing you're not supposed to say); Best Music to Hugo; best original song must go to Man or Muppet by Bret McKenzie (Flight of the Conchords) for The Muppets; Sound mixing and sound editing to Transformers: Dark of the Moon (look, it deserves something for being so frickin' cool); in the very tough line-up for best visual effects, Transformers, Hugo, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 and the fabulous Real Steal will all graciously bow to the rightful winner - Rise of the Planet of the Apes. The motion capture work combined with an outstanding performance by Andy Serkis in this fabulous movie to set a new benchmark for how emotionally compelling a digitally rendered film can be. Notably, Spielberg's The Adventures of Tin Tin was not nominated, chiefly because it failed to do precisely what Apes did so superbly.